Texas Nissan of Grapevine

Before we made the deal on my minivan, I spotted another one at Texas Nissan of Grapevine online, so Kate and I went over to check it out. Yesterday I received an automated email from their general manager asking me about my experience...and I just thought I'd share my response to him with you:

I wasn’t going to reply to this email; in fact I had to dig it out of my trash bin to do so. However I feel the need to this morning.

My visit to your Pre-owned dealership was both insulting and laughable. I came in because I had seen a minivan online that was within my price range and I wanted to look at it in person. I walked into the office and stood there for a while before anyone came to ask if I had been helped. That surprises me, seeing as all of your offices have glass walls so I was very visible. I assume a woman pushing a baby stroller doesn’t look like she’s going to buy a car. A couple of sales guys were standing around laughing and being obnoxious boys, and finally after he finished playing with a golf club Esat asked if I had been helped.

I said no, and he said “Well why not?” That’s a good question, but anyway…so I told him I was there to see a minivan I had seen online, and as soon as I got out the word Chrysler he cut me off and said “That Pacifica? It’s sold.” So I had to correct him and tell him it was a Town & Country. It had apparently been sold as well. He asked if I was trading a car and I told him that I was trading an ’03 Pathfinder, so he asked if I had it appraised and I said that I had an offer of $6500 on it. He asked if he could look at it and beat that offer, would I sell it to him? Well sure.

After waiting in his office with my daughter, Esat came in with an offer from “his manager” of $4800 and tells me to “just sign here”. See, I apparently don’t look like someone who passed first grade math, because anyone over the age of 6 knows that 65 is higher than 48. Or perhaps he just thought I was lying about my offer in hopes of getting more money out of you guys, but I was not. I managed not to laugh in his face at his offer, and told him no thanks because I had higher offers than that. Then I said “Even Carmax is higher” which they were – they offered me $6000. Naturally he has to run off to a manager’s office again (one of the many reasons why I despise car salesmen) and then comes back to tell me they’ll match Carmax’s offer. At this point, I had already been insulted too many times to consider selling you my car. If you wanted it that bad in the first place, you should have come with a reasonable offer instead of trying to take me for some moron.

I had told him previously that we were the only owners of the car. When Esat came into the office with your ridiculous offer, he told me that they ran the Carfax and it showed 3 owners….so basically he was calling me a liar. I was pretty angry by that, and probably should have told him that yes, if he actually bothered to read the report he would see that the three owners were my father-in-law, my mother-in-law, and my husband. So WE were the only people who had ever owned the car. But I wasn’t willing to justify him with a response at this point.

I was ready to leave far before I was allowed to because my keys were conveniently left in his manager’s office. Even when I finally got him to stop trying to tell me that the other people who were offering me more money were trying to scam me and he had “my best interests” at heart, and he told me to have a good day, I still had to ask for my keys again.

Basically my experience with your dealership reminded me why I hate car dealers. So thanks. I won’t make the mistake of walking into another one for a while. But I will have you know that I did buy a minivan for an even trade on my car – in fact it didn’t cost me a penny – just some ink.

Brandi Korte